Biology was Robotics Before it was Cool. Katherine Scott Computer Vision Engineer [email protected] http://www.kscottz.com July 19, 2013 Katherine Scott BioBots 

Biology was Robotics Before It Was Cool Nature had all of the good ideas first. Katherine Scott BioBots 

When I was a young When I was a young lady I didn’t want to be a software engineer... I actually wanted to be a biomedical engineer. Or some other kind of kick-ass scientist. Katherine Scott BioBots 

My First Week at University of Michigan Got up extra early. Looked through a big book. Picked the coolest one. I had work study. UROP paid as well as waiting tables. Got to hang out in a lab. By blind luck it was a robotics lab with a few women in it. Katherine Scott BioBots 

DARPA Rules! Lab was sponsored by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Looking at how cockroaches moved. Can we replicate it? Instead of making robots that moved like roaches can we control roaches like robots? Katherine Scott BioBots 

Turns out there are no unsolved problems in robotics. Mother nature has got this stuff solved. The sensors, actuators, and controllers on this bug are perfect. We just need to take it apart and figure out how it works. Katherine Scott BioBots 

Some of my old lab mates wanted to educate students on neuroscience. They commericalized some of the technology so students could learn from it. They kindly donated materials for today! Katherine Scott BioBots 

What about the inverse problem? Can we make roaches robots? Katherine Scott BioBots 

Remember your sensors... Limit switch.... Katherine Scott BioBots 

Can we hack into the roaches’ sensors? Katherine Scott BioBots 

How does a roach work? +/-3V Signal Biphasic Square Wave Roughly 10-100Hz Emulates the signal the neurons would generate. Don’t worry, the roach will be just fine, we’ll leave him a lot of sensor. Katherine Scott BioBots 

So what is going on here? Control signals sent from phone via bluetooth. On the board bluetooth cpu gets the message, and generates a waveform. We then amplify it a bit and send it to the roach via leads. Roach says, gee, feels like something is there. Katherine Scott BioBots 

So should we give it a try? Katherine Scott BioBots 

Could we take this to the next level? Katherine Scott BioBots 

What are the parts to getting this done? DO NOT PANIC. Break the problem down to little chunks and solve each chunk. Find a bluetooth library to “talk” to the roach backpack. Find a library that can get images from the kinect. Write some code to get the roach position / orientation. Write some code to find the line. Write some code that figures out the difference between the roach and the line. Figure out a way to relate that difference to stimulation. Katherine Scott BioBots 

Roaches are just the tip of the iceberg... Stereo vision is something we use everyday, why not robots? Katherine Scott BioBots 

Roaches are just the tip of the iceberg... Bats get around with sonar, why not robots? Katherine Scott BioBots 

Roaches are just the tip of the iceberg... We can figure out stuff with our hands? Why not robots? Katherine Scott BioBots 

The best part about robotics. You’ll never be chained to a desk. You’ll be working with every engineering discipline, biologists, psychologists, and designers. It really is a true interdisciplinary field. Katherine Scott BioBots 

GO BUILD ROBOTS! Here are a few resources to get you started! Back Yard Brains I Heart Robotics FIRST Robotics Competition Robot Operating System (ROS) Nodebots! Build a Tapsterbot GO VISIT A HACKER SPACE. Katherine Scott BioBots